Long-range shooting is one of the biggest trends on today’s shooting scene, big enough that it’s driving purpose-designed new rifles and riflescope models. Whether your game is hunting, tactical, competitive or simply recreational, there’s a movement within it to stretch the distance at which you can consistently and precisely hit a target. And there should be — pulling off a tricky shot on a small target a half-mile away is challenging, gratifying and takes skill and practice.

We had a great weekend in Langley during the Silvercore CFSC/CRFSC course. Thank you to every one that came out and trained with Silvercore this weekend no matter what location or course you attended. We look forward to seeing you all again soon!

Despite my typical focus on tactical shooting here on the Lounge, I‘ve actually got a very special place on my heart for shotgunning. I’ve always loved shotgun sports, and if I could shoot just one type of gun for the rest of my life, it would be a shotgun. There’s really nothing like the thrill of tracking that fast-moving target knowing you’ve got just a second or two to hit it. The rush that comes with firing and seeing that target break is absolutely euphoric, and one of the best things about shotgun sports is that it offers one of the most level playing fields of any shooting sport.

While high-end shotguns are some of the most extravagant and expensive guns made, it certainly doesn’t mean you need to shell out several thousand dollars to be able to succeed on a skeet or trap field. Unlike rifles and pistols where more money means objectively better accuracy or clearer and more precise optics, shotguns are limited by the somewhat primitive nature of their ammunition. Pushing a bunch of tiny pellets through a smooth tube just isn’t that complicated, and because of that there are great shotguns that can fit nearly any budget. If you’ve never shot clays with a shotgun, you really owe it to yourself to try it. To that end, here are some great low-cost guns to get you started breaking clays.

New BCWF Affinity Partner: Silvercore Training! Silvercore Advanced Training Systems has signed up as a BCWF affinity partner and offers exclusive discounts to BCWF Members Silvercore is British Columbia’s premier firearms training center, offering various courses throughout the province. Silvercore has been teaching the CFSC/CRFSC since it’s inception, and now provide a wide range of courses including CORE, Live fire, Combatives and Bear Defence. BCWF Members are entitled to a 10% discount on any Silvercore course. For more information, please visit the Silvercore website at http://www.silvercore.ca or phone 604-940-7785. Discount excludes Use of Force training, private instruction and corporate courses. Check out other discounts for members by logging into the member only login section of the BCWF website. Login to the eCommunity and click on Affinity Partner Discounts for all details. If you aren’t registered for the eCommunity, it’s simple and free and will grant you access to exclusive member-only content! http://ow.ly/NfvLI

As gun enthusiasts, most of us are probably familiar to some extent with the term battle rifle. While at first it might seem as though that term would refer to any rifle used in combat, it actually has pretty narrow definition in common parlance. Battle rifles are autoloading rifles firing so-called “full-power” ammunition, such as .308 Winchester, and utilizing detachable magazines. The most famous battle rifles are the M14, FAL, and the G3, but there are many others.

For me, the battle rifle has always been an artifact of small arms design which marks the point where modern firearms development fell just short of understanding modern warfare. The battle rifle was often too much gun in practical applications, and yet, just as modern militaries had seen the light of the intermediate cartridges like 5.56 and 7.62x39mm, they also realized that they might just have had the right tool at the wrong time.

Birth of the Battle Rifle

While most battle rifles are post WWII designs, the first saw combat in World War I…